skg02
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Posts posted by skg02
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What I particularly like in this is the delayed reporting mechanism. That alone will make it a superior system.
The attention to logistics, industry/tech, and troop/officer development look very good.
If this works it will probably be better than anything Paradox is doing or the Total War series.
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Can't wait for this. Just got back to UA:AoS. Damn fun. What would be great to see per above is a treatment of French/Indian Wars that captures the crucial use of rivers.
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Had this happen with UA:Age of Sail and got no help on that board. Now I'm having the same problem with UA:Dreadnaughts.
All my other steam games launch fine off-line.
Game-Labs won't launch and crash to desktop.
This is not a needs an update issue either - set them all to restricted time window for downloads, no background downloads.
I have another game that has a lot of mods that I don't want to connect with Steam because of - the workshop mods update independent of game update and not Steam setting rules.
Shouldn't have to worry about this with Game-Labs products, what's going on.
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As it turns out the base game update controls are not the issue. I know how to control that. But, as I'd feared its the workshop mods, I run 35 of them on Stellaris, and that's a average to low number compared to others. Workshop mods update no matter what when running steam online. So have to confirm a work-around for that.
None of the above addresses what I view to be a GameLabs issue - none of my other Steam games crash like this when I run offline, some of which I haven't played at all. For UA:AoS all I did was check integrity and open it, everything fine, then closed and left it for a few months, then try to open it offline and crash - shouldn't do that.
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LAVA.
Thx for response.
Will watch video to make sure I'm not missing anything on verifying game integrity.
Question on your practice and experience with Steam updates and workshop mods - to confirm my impressions.
Do you do this my editing the acf file or through the settings menu?
Also, if you apply a time limit window for downloads through settings does that apply to the game AND the workshop mods associated with that game or just the game? - that's my biggest concern - running 35 mods can make the game+mods a bit "humpty-dumpty".
Also, if you run steam with the time-setting window on for update downloads, that means outside the window you can run steam to check integrity of files without auto-triggering update activity, right?
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Have had this happen twice now. Don't open the game for a while off-line after doing successful launch, then try to as I did tonight and game crashes to desktop.
None of my other Steam games exhibit this behavior, what's going on?
I play off-line to avoid the auto-update of other games, specifically Stellaris (lots of frustration toward pdx right now with their endless changes that break the game I like).
Is there a way to check steam files without triggering update of all steam games?
Wondering if there's a pathway back to playing the non-steam version of this game - was an early purchaser.
If I understand right though, that means having to play with an internet connection, or is that not the case?
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3 hours ago, DougToss said:
The gunnery model needs a lot of work. The more sources you read, analyse and disseminate in posts, the more you bring that to the attention of the community, and hopefully the devs.
The strength of the one I quoted is that its a late war (1944) training manual and it walks you through and breaks down all the parts that go into naval munitions and fire control.
I've had an interest in WW2 ships for over 40 years - built a bunch of 1/700 waterlines even in jr. high, but this game has really made me realize how shallow my real knowledge was. The really essential books for this game as base source are two of Friedman's earliest ones I think:
One on firepower: Naval Firepower
One in general on battleship design - this one should be foundational to anything going on in this game I think - its even got equations and graphs on which designs were established, and a BS check methodology for checking stated info: Battleship Design and Development You can almost use this book practically to design ships.
Assuming those are two of your sources of knowledge too?
I just got this one:Naval Weapons of World War Two, so planning to read through it for the propellant-bursting charge questions as well. Still also getting through the others - as well - a lot to absorb 🙂.
What I'd hope is devs would open up a little more than they've done already on their though processes and make use of the knowledge here on the board more than they've done. People like yourself, Roachbeef, and Steeltrap to name a few that stand out to me.
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It would be helpful for devs to clarify a little more on what is what in our choice of ammo "explosives" as they are now.
I can track Lyddite, and Cordite ok - the latter seems more like a propellant certainly than a shell filler. But what is "High TNT" - is that TNT with RDX in it? Tube Powder certainly is traceable and its German, but why does that mean heavier, less ammo det chance, and better penetration?
I'd be happy with the devs just giving us more of their rough note research and interpretation on this and why they named stuff the way they did, or just bullet point a little more info so we can follow their logic a little more, maybe include the emphasis of a choice such as "Cordite II - mostly propellant oriented." or "Lyddite - composed mostly of picric acid".
The questions get more and deeper on this once you pick up and read something like Naval Ordnance and Gunnery for the US Navy.
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Nick.
Hope your programmer gets well soon, and hope its not the covid plague.
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13 hours ago, Steeltrap said:
I personally don't care a bit about the campaign as I find it's rather pointless stuffing around on a campaign map if the tactical battles that result still have egregious issues with them if we're to take the "realistic" tag seriously.
In other words, fix those things still significantly broken before worrying about the broader context within which they fit.
If BOTH can be done, and we can test elements of the campaign, OK.
I rather suspect that can't be done effectively, as the in-battle issues will blow back on the campaign in potentially game-breaking ways.
I know I will simply stuff my designs with bulkheads and already have an insurmountable advantage over any other ship that's identical in every other respect. For as long as that remains true, releasing it to the broader public is simply asking for a lot of people to come to the same conclusion and then splatter that all over Steam.
That would be both terrible for the game PLUS grossly unfair in the sense of where the game's supposedly going. Yet it would be accurate, and people can and should only review what they see, not what they're promised.
I agree on not letting it out into the wider world before getting it done in workable form on the campaign. I should think the campaign will have to deal with introducing land, islands, coasts, ect. Unless campaigns are just going to be WW1 North Sea like.
The armor system and maybe the propellant/explosive system needs work. Reading up on how real armor schemes were really clarifies the need on the armor system.
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15 hours ago, Donluca95 said:
Hi guys, what about Saving features ? A lot of people love simple things
1- Saving your ship design in/for custom battle ?
2- Design more than 1 ship category in your fleet ?
3- Choosing Enemy designs for custom battle ?
Will all of this be released with the Campaign ? Do we have any hope to see this features add to the game before it ?
Because if we can't have any precise idea of when the Campaign will be release, we will not have idea also for this "Saving/Sand Box features" right?
Here, Here.
This is a big one for the advancement of the game. If the omni-direction-choice is too hard for the above.
Might be an idea to trial some new naval missions with developer fixed designs rather than AI fixed designs, so some relatively accurate historical battles might be better set-up.
These dev-based ship designs then make a start on getting to a ship design data base - some of the first of these ships, if the battles are picked right can go into subsequent new naval missions of this new type.
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Just playing Dreadnaughts vs. Modern Cruisers and have to say the way too high speed issue for AI ships is still alive and well.
Plain and simple this just needs to be fixed for this game to be a serious treatment of the subject.
You've got BC's going speeds that would make some destroyers embarrassed.
Its just ridiculous when combined with their supernatural ability to hit at that speed as well - like they are taking no penalty for that high speed.
I'm sure these comments are repeated above, consider them reinforcement to the point.
Also think the cruiser modelling needs some work so what was IRL can be in the game - 5" twins for US and the standard 4 twin 5" mounts found on Myoko-Takao-Mogami Japanese CA's.
This shows up when same tower, different size ship for US and 5" won't mount, but 4" will.
Hulls are just a little too narrow now, which I'm wondering whether throws off the roll ratings.
Further, seems like there's a constant tendency for a prejudice in the game engine toward a forward weight offset on everything, so the rear turret(s) end up having to be placed in extended armor position and promptly getting destroyed because of it. Again, reinforcement to the point already probably made above I'm sure.
Also, looks like some work is needed on AI designs in terms of stack and secondary barbette placement, very Frankenstein at times.
Eventually would be good to see US Iowas stack taken out of Japanese design options which especially for Japanese rebuilt dreadnaughts or any other BB's other than modern, should probably go with British WWI style.
Really, want this game to succeed, so comments are only meant constructively.
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Very good idea.
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I think the trick on the forward turrets for the US Modern DD problem described is to use the control button and move the forward most turret forward a little, then things seem to work.
Nice work on the Destroyers devs.
Notice the flash fire effects are quite significant across ammo types - white powder now isn't so perfect anymore. Tube Powder advantages for risk are now more significant, TNT also better that way too.
You really take your life in your hands now going super heavy shells as well.
Going forward seems like there might need to be some work on matching turret size with barbette size though on the Italo-French cruisers - turrets are gigantic on tiny barbettes.
Haven't checked yet, but all the U.S. style cruisers should allow 5" twins per historic in the last updates, the towers looked the same, but could only put 4" on them, where the historic 5" .38 cals go.
Also, need to check out the Japanese rebuilt dreadnaughts - think the stacks should be from the British WW1 selection - in Alpha 5 you could end up with an Iowa funnel on these or the Japanese Yamato/Cruiser style funnel. All the Japanese funnels for WW1 era through to Nagato's should be the British style funnels from WW1.
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RAMJB:
One of the things that was keeping me from making videos of the game was the fix to the excessive speeds (not to mention, at far too early stages) that you saw in the battles. Good news indeed, was really needed ;).
The other thing that's keeping me from making videos of the game is that there's no news about an overhaul of the armor layout system that produces ships were, for instance, the "armor belt" of the designer might aswell be swapped by "hull armor", magazines aren't always covered by your thickest armor, and has the effect of making the armored ends of ships so unrealistically armored that they make WarGaming-like "bow in" tactics look like a sensible representation of naval tactics.Not to mention that it ruins the use of AP and force the use of HE when it makes no historical sense at all. Still waiting for some word about that side of the game to come. The current armor system is a gamebreaking feature for me, as much as the unrealistic speeds achievable were.
For the record, it's not that I'm not making videos because of a "if you don't introduce this thing I'm talking about, I won't make stuff of it", but because the excessive speeds and the ultra-simplistic armor models make up for...let's say, very unrealistic battles that I had a very hard time making constructive criticism about. There's just so many times you can say "this is because this is early stage, it'll get changed somewhere down the line" without becoming tremendously repetitive :D, and I only want to showcase the game when what's seen in the videos showcases it very positively for fans of the genre...Because people like me, who have an interest in naval history, when they see a 41knot battlecruiser with a 13 inch armored belt that covers it from waterline to freeboard and laughs at you shooting AP at strong angles, they're going to raise an eyebrow and not feel very interested. And I want people to like what they see so they buy the game ;).
Appreciate you for keeping to bang the drum on those issues. I'd like to see this game be as accurate as it can be. I remember Fighting Steel Project for it really working on accurate portrayal of gunnery, even with the limits of its graphics.
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piotreh1:
I'm with you now on the 25% speed move/turning 100% - its the one way to get extra speed and a great turning bonus without burning the improvement slot. Good officers and sword bayonet weapons can get the gunnery+boarding of the hth 2nd level. Well I feel better now knowing I'm not alone on getting 3rd level. Probably going to sell my hth Hermione, so I can get another to get the sailing speed, go hull2-sailspeed3-carriages3, mount Woolich 18pdr-12pdr EIC Carronade combo and crew up to 285 max for boarding, still have good speed.
Ship classes - favorites are the Endymion and Leda - especially the later with 4 improvement slots - put 12pdr Bogard Longs-18pdr EIC Carronade combo on that and named it the USS Saratoga (to join the USS Lexington Endymion) - it will be the USS Des Moines CA for the Age of Sail. Endymions are so damned fast even with hull3 and fully loaded up - probably because of my notch down in gun weights. My fleet names are going to be like the US World War 2 Carrier fleet 🙂.
On Career points, came to think go first aid on crew first - if you keep more guys, its in effect like training speed through battle, then go to training speed itself.
In prep for Martinque have put some Congreves on - one ship has these on bottom, and 6pdr Desagulier's on top.
All prepped now for Martinique, just need to do a final check before playing it - want to take Intrepid and its escorts - but also see if I can pick off and capture another big boy up the line from the rear.
A comment on your earlier to consider on whether to take ships in the rear of the column or front - what's the wind? If the wind is going in the direction of the enemy column, take and cut out an enemy ship from the rear of the column, then you can break it free and tack it away from being retaken and shield it with your own ships. Challenge is a really good scenario to practice capture and shielding captured ships. I had to play it a number of times, but finally took all 3 frigates, both transports, and one of the SOL's, for heavy damage, crew loss, but no ship loss on my side.
One of the things I really like about this game, reminding me of the personal management in Medieval Total War 2 (still such a good game - especially the Middle Earth mods), is the officer development - had to hire every available officer to lead the 9 ships I'm taking in, had to spread them out and compromise on assignments - but that's officer development. If I play this campaign again, won't be dismissing many officers no matter how poor they are, so I can develop them when I need to.
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piotreh1:
I used to not like Porcupines, but then I realized how slow the Cerberus's were, especially when filled up. I like the flexiblility of having the two decks - heavies on the lower, and Carronades up top. Also, found that they can put less burden on your Armory - spreads out the distribution of guns. Your all in and sometimes too heavy or not enough guns with Cerberus's. Too avoid boarding problem on VI I had them already very fast, but loaded them up to max of 210 men, and avoided tangling with the 280 man ships. BTW playing on normal difficulty.
Woolich - lighter weight for same shot weight, without too heavy a penalty on range, pen at range compared to some - the 12pdrs are same 9 weight as 9pdr Desaguliers, but do 10 rather than 7 damage, about the same reload time. Woolich are pretty good price at 12, 18 pdr level - very expensive for the 24 pdrs though. I have not used Congreves yet.
After another couple battles have decided to go with sailing 2nd level skill for Hermione class frigates instead of hth/boarding - +%25 speed for move and turning opens up using 18 pdr Woolich and maximized crew while maintaining good speed. Then take the 3rd skill up grade in +10% in boarding, melee, and gunnery - the x'd pistols one to the left.
Just curious if anyone else feels like its quite an effort to get that 3rd level? 2nd level is not hard at all to get to, even swapping crew in/out of reserve. Maybe not enough of my crew are surviving. For career points I've spent mid-way through first on first aid wounded which in a way is like training, now I'm boosting training up.
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Up to retaking Savannah in the American Campaign and concluded the following about ships issued free by Congress:
Early on they are welcome and the best you can get, later on they can be a burden. The game lets you sell them and then like every other ship you sell they show up in the Admiralty's assortment and the best available to buy for the most part - nothing much else there.
Suggestion. Provide choice at the point where Congress is issuing ships - they can be accepted per current campaign without cost, or turned down for a increase in Prestige points that's boosted by say 50% over their normal prize sale price to the admiralty. If accepted and later on not needed, they can be sold not for money, but for their normal prize sale price in Prestige. If the ship is not accepted or if its turned in later it doesn't go to the admiralty assortment to avoid gamey player abuse - its assumed to be in use elsewhere and not available.
The idea is to capture an American Congress with scant resources and raising the stature of a self-sufficient naval officer that is growing the US Navy on his own to the point that he's turning down or giving back resources he can do without so they can be used else where. If I'm John Paul Jones and I gave back a corvette or say I don't need it, so it can be used elsewhere by the US Navy, than it should be easier for me to go to Congress and say "What I really need is 500 Charleville 1777 Sea Service w/Sword bayonets for my Marines".
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piotreh1.
Posted about Valcour Island on your tactics thread, but to add here following. Up to Valcour Island I had taken and bought a bunch of Porcupines, so I sold the ones Congress gave me and used my own. Had watched History Guy Gamings redo of this first, and so avoided the retreat pitfall. I kind of played for bit as he suggested, getting my little guys down near the end, but also fought in stages more to that point. Eventually concluded that my little guys had no value at all and worse sailing qualities, so just got them off. The dilution of crew to take any of the smaller British leading ships, just not worth it. My 3 ships with 12pdr Woolich/12pdr EIC Carronades combo, expert crews, and good officers, just tore the leading ships up - got 7 without loss. Several surrendered and I just let them be un-surrendered and then sank them. Picked my officers right, so got 5 out of 6 of them promoted. I did take about 30% crew casualties though with the close in nature of the fight.
Charlie1957.
Actually liked this mission for a change of pace - usually I'm taking ships, this time I just focused on sinking ships.
Half the fun of this game is learning how to use the wind for the particular ships you have and then maneuver a whole squadron of them accordingly - there's real art and beauty to this.
There are some subtle, but important differences in how the different classes respond to wind, especially I've found among the 5th rate frigates.
I like the confined nature of this scenario also, the weird wind and maneuvering around the island near the exit area.
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From the above comments, going to have to try round shot raking more, I've been using grape shot. Have my hands full enough yet keeping track of where and how all my ships are to do targeted shots to kill masts. Up to now, just finished Valcour Island on American after full as it is available British, mostly focus on boarding and taking ships instead of sinking, the prestige currency is just too valuable to pass up.
Guns: heavily use Desagulier's guns for the range and penetration, living with the longer reload, smaller damage - they are like the "tube powder" for UA:Age of Sail. In American campaign seems lot more straight forward step wise to get access to more types of guns, so have determined I like the longer range EIC carronades, and Woolich for damage/rate of fire earlier. More below on outfitting the USS Congress. Also, in American campaign, the Desagulier's really help being able to stand off and avoid damage/inflict damage when you're out-gunned a lot. In Challenge they made my ships, with other improvements, very fast, which certainly helped one my frigates out run a SOL and escape, even with a lot of sail damage.
Upgrades: concluded my priorities on upgrades as follows: gun carriages-sail speed if possible together, hull structure, gun reload speed. Crew improvement priorities are stamina first, then the hand-to-hand, then if I can get it, the Sea Wolves (improvement to left). For transports get the sail speed second. the crew hand-to-hand avoids me needing to burn technology spending and ship slots on the boarding kit. The higher you go with sail speed the less weight there is to the improvements, gun carriages help that out further so you can both load up more crew for less speed loss and take more sail damage for less loss in absolute speed.
With 5th rates I'll go with hull3 and live with the speed/crew cap loss they can live longer going in close to take on SOL's. With 3rd rate I'll go with hull2 for better speed/less crew cap loss, since their base protection is formidable anyway. gun reload speed 3 offsets lag on using 32pdr French re-bored, 12pdr Borgard Long as my 2 primary deck choices on the 3rd rate I captured in Challenge - the HMS Kennington, then 12pdr EIC carronades for the top deck, for close-in. Think I should be able to get pretty good speed this way, get good, relatively high rate, long-range, very damaging fire. If I stay at long range and hurt, then also helps protect my unbuffed sails/masts. Going in to board and capture should then be against a much weakened foe, or just use the 3rd Rate to soften up ships for others.
Couple things I like to do is rake from the front travelling in the direction of the wind, and then turn toward green and run with it, rinse and repeat - if you can do a compromised version of that with two ships at the same time you make the enemy like he's sailing head first into a wood chipper. Another is "breaking the line": sailing right between two enemy ships raking one across front, one across rear. Have done this with several ships, but you have to sail straight through far enough before turning to avoid bad damage.
Since I mostly try to take ships and get them off the board as prizes - usually am trying to knock the crew down and not take down masts. Only try to shoot sails if its a big boy SOL.
In Valcour Island did notice the "dumb column" effect - the 280 man British, presumably 5th rates, provided no help at all, and at the end seem to mill around in "what do we do now" mode at the exit area. In that one used 3 of my Porcupine corvettes with sailspeed3, carriages3, 12pdr Woolich, 12pdr EIC Carronades to shred the British initial small ships - Woolich because the range was pretty short on the lake. Sailed, weaving back and forth with the wind, so at least two of my 3 could be firing both sides and hurting multiple ships at a time. The Porcupines can be quite lethal and useful - as configured above they're damned fast - I've found - much preferred over Cereberus class - better gun arrangement, faster.
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For the British I assume these will be 1 Chapter for continued war with France after American Revolution and then Napoleonic? Are there stirrings yet to continue some chapters British and American to the 1805-1815 era? Some of the most epic U.S. age of sail battles were in that era: Barbary Coast, War of 1812 - the time frame covered by the Book "Six Frigates". Highly recommend that - does a good job of covering both the wierd personalities of early U.S. Navy, but also the problems of operating and maintaining these ships - pretty cranky process.
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Going to replay it again anyway, since the sea battle part at the end caught me off guard. Will go in with my one big troop ship and all my frigates fully loaded, get in and get out.
Been fortunate so far not to have glitches like this, but haven't done the campaign as much on steam either - more delay in updates there. I submitted bug reports as they occurred in game.
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Third time I played got thru land battle ok, but my most powerful ship just disappeared at the end of the land battle. I had anchored it just inside first layer of shallows, was not aground.
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Just had this happen a second time playing above mission. Seems like it might be related to anything happening near the beach - too many landing boats for game to sort?
1st time happened during retreat to beach, 2nd time when fighting near the beach.
What happens is men freeze up and march in place and unit shields become frozen on screen in same place, decoupled from units, you can still move the map.
Also, game locks up so you have to task manager close it. This is the steam version Im playing.
Like to know if I'm alone experiencing this. I could understand if fixing something else later on in campaign, created this unintentionally, more experienced players further along never experiencing it.
Taking Screenshots Without Game Interface Showing
in General discussions
Posted
In Stellaris this is Cntrl-F9.
Is there a key combo in UA:AoS that does this?
Want to take some screenshots of my epic ship battles.